Sierra Club Canada to review ban on civil disobedience, with B.C. pipelines in mind

PETER O'NEIL, Vancouver Sun01.23.2013

John Bennett executive director of the Sierra Club Canada, the country’s largest national grassroots environmental organization, says the club’s board will consider lifting its prohibition on civil disobedience later this month.

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OTTAWA — One of Canada’s largest environmentalist organizers will decide later this month whether to drop its prohibition against civil disobedience — and if the Sierra Club of Canada takes that step the first target will be proposed oilsands pipelines to the B.C. coast.

Spokesman John Bennett, noting that the Sierra Club’s U.S. cousin has already taken that step, said the organization’s board is responding to grassroots members exasperated by the lack of government action on climate change.

“Governments on both sides of the border should take note … that the oldest and largest environmental organization in North America has become so concerned about the lack of action on climate change that it’s setting aside a long-held commitment to act only within the law,” declared a statement Wednesday by Sierra Club Canada.

“Science, logic and huge public support for action have all been thwarted by the fossil fuel industry and governments that do their bidding. People of conscience have been left with nowhere else to turn.”

“We believe that peaceful protest is entirely legitimate in a democratic society. However, it should be conducted within the confines of the law, and not put anyone at risk,” he said.

But Green Party leader Elizabeth May praised the decision and said she’d be prepared to participate in civil disobedience actions.

The U.S. Sierra Club, founded just before the turn of the 20th century, announced Tuesday it will end its prohibition against peaceful law-breaking in advance of a major protest in Washington, D.C., against TransCanada Pipelines’ proposed Keystone XL project to the U.S. Gulf Coast.

The Sierra Club has about 750,000 “members and supporters” in the U.S. and its Canadian affiliate has about 20,000, including roughly 6,000 in B.C., said Sierra Club Canada executive-director John Bennett.

He said pressure is building within his organization’s membership to follow the U.S. Sierra Club’s lead.

Bennett said frustrated Sierra Club members are prepared to stage sit-ins, participate in “symbolic arrests,” and in the case of oilsands pipelines “sit down in front of bulldozers” if two proposed megaprojects get federal regulatory approval.

“There’s not only interest, there’s pressure. I’ve had a number of occasions where people have raised this with me, and I’ve had to be the one who said, ‘no, you can’t do that,’” Bennett told The Vancouver Sun.

He predicted that protests against two proposed B.C. oilsands pipelines megaprojects, the Enbridge project to Kitimat and the Kinder Morgan expansion to Burnaby, will dwarf the mass demonstrations in Clayoquot Sound, B.C. in the early 1990s that led to hundreds of arrests.

“There will be thousands if not tens of thousands in the way of” construction crews if the projects get National Energy Board approval, he said.

New Democratic Party environment critic Megan Leslie wasn’t available for comment.

The Green Party’s May, a former Sierra Club Canada executive director, said she supports “morally-grounded non-violent civil disobedience” to oppose the pipelines.

May said in an email exchange Wednesday that she “chafed” against the Sierra Club policy against civil disobedience when she participated in anti-logging demonstrations during the massive 1993 campaign against logging on Clayoquot Sound in B.C.

“This change is long overdue and I hope the Canadian board will decide to follow the new U.S. club approach.”

May added that she would, given the “right circumstances” and “right reasons,” participate in civil disobedience actions.

B.C. Liberal MP Joyce Murray, a candidate for the federal party’s leadership and former B.C. environment minister, said she understands grassroots frustration and recognizes that civil disobedience has been behind many positive societal changes.

“But I’m not going to encourage people to break the law,” she told The Sun.

Enbridge spokesman Todd Nogier said the Calgary-based company invests considerable resources to address climate change, but added that “dialogue” within society should include the importance energy and pipelines play in North American citizens’ lives.

“We hope activist groups are not adopting confrontation over conversation in their approach to such an important societal issue,” he said in a statement.

Travis Davies of the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers cited polls in the U.S. that suggest the public views Canada as a reliable and environmentally-responsible energy supplier.

Bennett said he’s only aware of one major organization that advocates civil disobedience — Greenpeace. A former Greenpeace campaigner, Bennett said he once broke into an Ontario nuclear power plant in the 1970s to prove security was lax. And 20 years ago he was convicted and given an absolute discharge for obstructing police at a demonstration outside Environment Canada headquarters in Gatineau, Quebec.

Bennett noted that the Canadian and U.S. Sierra Clubs, while independent of each other, try to coordinate North American campaigns and have consistent policies.

The U.S. Sierra Club’s first Canadian branch opened in B.C. in 1963. The national Sierra Club was established in 1989.

Twitter.com/poneilinottawaRead his blog, Letter from Ottawa, at vancouversun.com/oneil

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Sierra Club Canada to review ban on civil disobedience, with B.C. pipelines in mind

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